> Neoteny is the retention by adults of traits previously seen only in
> juveniles of that species (pedomorphosis/paedomorphosis), and is a
> subject studied in the field of developmental biology.
>
> In neoteny, the physiological
> (or somatic) development of an
> animal or organism is
> slowed or delayed.
>
> Ultimately this process results
> in the retention, in the adults
> of a species, of juvenile physical
> characteristics well into maturity.
>
> Specific individual traits that differ in descendant organisms, when
> compared to ancestors, are sometimes called neotenies; humans, for
> example, appear to have several neotenies in comparison to
> chimpanzees.
>
> Humans exhibit a number of prominent neotenies compared to the other
> great apes. Adulthood begins in chimps at about 2-3 years; in humans
> this occurs between the 14th and 17th year.
>
> Neoteny is not the only contributing factor affecting maturation in
> species that may have undergone neotenous changes over the course of
> their evolution, and its actual involvement in the following examples
> is not well understood:
>
> 1. flightless birds—physical proportions resemble those of the chicks
> of flighted birds;
>
> 2. humans—with traits such as sparse body hair and enlarged heads
> reminiscent of baby primates.
>
> 3. dogs—which share many physical features with the immature wolf;
> these same traits were found during the development of the tame silver
> fox
>
>
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neoteny
>
> The Science of Romance - by Nigel
Barberhttp://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/1573929700/
>
> THE DOUBLE STANDARD OF AGING
>
> Men's physical attractiveness to women declines with age, but the
> decline is generally less steep than that of women to men. In what
> might be called the second cardinal rule of dating, men want partners
> who are a year or two younger than they are, while women, in general,
> want to date older men. As men age, they want women who are
> increasingly younger than they are. A man of forty, for example, is
> likely to want a partner who is ten years younger. Why?
>
> The most fundamental reason relates to limitation of women's ability
> to conceive children with advancing years. Fertility reaches a high
> point in the early twenties and stays on a plateau until the age of
> thirty-five, after which it declines sharply. Natural selection would
> have caused men to select fertile women as wives since those who were
> attracted to women over fifty would have left no offspring to carry on
> their unusual taste. However, men see women as more attractive at
> twenty than at forty. This is right at the beginning of their most
> fertile phase in the life span.
>
> Men are thus most attracted to women who are at the beginning of their
> reproductive career. If a man marries a woman of this age, then he has
> the potential of giving her all of her children and thereby hitting
> the reproductive jackpot. Natural selection has thus favored men who
> are attracted to younger fertile women rather than older fertile
> women. For this reason, the perception of youthfulness is critical to
> the physical attractiveness of women. This helps explain the success
> of the cosmetics industry, as women attempt to conceal signs of aging
> and try to appear younger and more attractive.
>
> Men reach the peak of their physical attractiveness to women in the
> late teens or early twenties. However, as they grow older, they
> acquire social status and wealth, which enhances the value of the
> overall package as far as a marriage partner is concerned. Although
> men deteriorate with age, their physical appearance is less critical
> to their overall attractiveness. One important cue to feminine
> youthfulness that plays an important role in women's physical
> attractiveness is their bodily shape.
>
> SELXUAL SELECTION AND THE HOURGLASS FIGURE
>
> The body shapes of men and women are sexually selected traits,
> analogous to the plumage of the peacock. Strange as it might seem,
> this conclusion is supported by much compelling evidence. To begin
> with, feminine curves emerge around puberty, just like the colorful
> train of the peacock (see fig. 2). They are produced by the same
> mechanism, a surge in production of sex hormones. A surge of the sex
> hormone estrogen stimulates the filling of fat cells located away from
> the waist. The "loudness" of the signal (i.e., the size of the sex
> difference) diminishes with age. In the same way, the greater height
> of men, their broader shoulders, their deeper voices, and their
> greater upper-body musculature are due to the growth spurt produced by
> a surge in testosterone production at puberty.
>
> Both sexes agree that women with "hourglass figures" are sexy and
> attractive (see fig. 3). This contrasts with the attractive male body.
> In sexy men, there is little difference between the hip and waist
> dimensions, the torso is moderately muscled, and the shoulders are
> broad. The attractiveness of an hourglass figure for women is a
> constant across cultures and across time, although the amount of
> curvature considered desirable varies greatly in different countries
> and at different times within a society.
>
> Scientists assess the curvaceousness of the human body using a
> statistic known as the waist/hip ratio. A small waist/hip ratio is
> equivalent to a highly curvaceous body. Highly attractive women, such
> as Miss Americas, have a waist/hip ratio of about 0.67 (the ratio
> produced by a waist of 24" and hips of 36", for example). The normal
> range for women is 0.67-0.80, whereas the normal range for men is
> 0.85-0.95. Lack of an overlap between the male and the female range
> means that body shape is a highly predictable sex difference.
>
> The intensity of the signal (i.e., the size of the sex difference)
> declines with age due to a change in hormone production. If you are on
> the beach and spot a couple strolling away from you in the distance,
> distinguishing the silhouette of the man from the woman will be very
> easy if the couple is in their twenties, but much more difficult if
> they are in their fifties.
>
> One distinguishing characteristic of the peacock's tail is that it
> interferes with movement. Similarly, storage of fat away from the
> waist is not mechanically efficient. It makes more sense to store fat
> close to the center of gravity, in the abdomen. Highly curvaceous
> women are at a distinct disadvantage in sports and rarely win Olympic
> medals-for example, in events requiring agility and speed, such as
> basketball and running. This is not to claim that curvaceous women
> cannot be very athletic. Some are, but when they compete at the
> highest level, they experience a mechanical disadvantage because
> weight stored away from the center of gravity introduces turning
> forces that use up energy.
>
> Just as peahens are attracted to an extremely colorful mate, so
> extremely attractive women are at an extreme of the range for
> curvaceousness. Beauty contest winners cluster at the curvaceous
> extreme of 0.67 compared to the normal range for women of 0.67-0.80.
>
> Perhaps the most important and compelling point of similarity is that
> curvaceous women, like showy peacocks, have superior immune systems.
> According to recent research ot'Devendra Singh, an evolutionary
> psychologist at the University of Texas at Austin, college-aged women
> and men agree that curvaceous women (whether of normal weight,
> underweight, or overweight) are more attractive, healthier, and more
> capable of producing children than less curvaceous women. What makes
> these findings really interesting is that they are borne out by
> medical data. Women with low waist/hip ratio (i.e., with a curvaceous
> build) not only have less difficulty becoming pregnant, they are also
> healthier in terms of a lower incidence of many illnesses. Women with
> relatively noncurvaceous bodies are at a higher risk for gall bladder
> disease, some cancers, diseases of the heart and circulatory system,
> and for diabetes. (It is important to realize that a curvaceous body
> is different from an obese one: curvaceous women store fat away from
> the abdomen whereas obese women usually have thick fat deposits around
> their middle which pose major health risks.) Noncurvaceous women are
> also more prone to behavioral disorders such as anxiety and drug
> abuse. (It is true that some drug addictions can cause people to lose
> weight, which might make them less curvaceous, but the finding applies
> equally for alcoholism, which can have the opposite effect.) Less
> curvaceous women are more likely to be admitted to psychiatric
> hospitals for depression and other psychopathologies. They also have
> higher mortality rates. The health consequences of body shape in men
> have received less attention because the waist/hip ratio is not
> routinely measured for medical records and is thus unavailable to
> researchers. Women are at their most curvaceous in early maturity, and
> one reason that men are attracted to women with sexy bodies is that
> this is a cue to youthfulness. Exceptionally attractive women have
> youthful facial dimensions that make them seem more attractive than
> they really are.
>
> EXAGGERATING YOUTH
>
> Men are very sensitive to age cues, since a woman's age places
> limitations on her ability to produce children. It is true that men
> may be motivated by opportunities for sexual intercourse rather than
> opportunities for reproducing, but natural selection has designed them
> to want sex with fertile women. The sex difference in the importance
> of youthfulness to physical attractiveness explains why women are much
> more interested in using makeup to make them seem young and healthy
> than men are.
>
> Highly attractive women, such as film actresses, often preserve their
> good looks into old age. The impression of youthfulness is so
> powerfully conveyed by the design of their faces that seeing them as
> old is difficult. When you see Candice Bergen, now well into her
> fifties, for example, your response is likely to be, "What a
> stunningly beautiful woman!" rather than "Candice seems to be well
> into her fifties."
>
> Highly attractive women's faces mimic some facial proportions normally
> found only in young girls. This is not just true of our own culture
> with its exaltation of all things youthful, but in Japan and other
> countries. The extent of this phenomenon can be grasped from the fact
> that attractive male faces tend to have large chins, a feature
> associated with age and maturity, whereas attractive female faces have
> reasonably small chins and therefore resemble the faces of children.
> Similarly, small noses contribute to the attractiveness of women's
> faces, but the size of the nose is unrelated to attractiveness of
> men.
>
> Other youthful traits that people see as attractive in women (but not
> men) in different cultures include dainty hands and small feet. These
> are not just smaller in women because they have shorter stature, but
> they are proportionately smaller. Small feet were such a critical
> feature of attractiveness in China that parents kept their daughters'
> artificially small through the hideous practice of foot binding. From
> a biological perspective, small chins, feet, and hands are
> attributable to low levels of testosterone, which promotes bone
> growth. Since testosterone reduces female fertility, they are thus an
> outward sign of a hormonal profile conducive to high fertility in
> women.
>
> Victor Johnson, an evolutionary psychologist working at the University
> of New Mexico at Las Cruces, has collected other evidence that shows
> the extensive effects of sexual selection on the female face. Johnson
> and his associate used a computer program that allowed people to
> "evolve" their perfect faces over many "generations." One striking
> aspect of the perfect faces was that many dimensions were typical of
> much younger faces. Although people estimated the age of the perfect
> faces as close to twenty-five years, on average, the proportions of
> the lips (their fullness) was characteristic of fourteen-year-old
> faces, while the length of the face, from eyes to chin, was shortened
> to that typical of an eleven-year-old.
>
> Just as male peacocks have competed with each other to be very
> colorful, so women have competed to exaggerate the impression of
> youthfulness and health conveyed by their faces, as already noted. The
> reproductive significance of youthfulness for women helps to explain
> why they are prepared to spend a lot of money on cosmetics that create
> an impression of youth and health. Expensive creams promise to remove
> wrinkles, those telltale signs of aging, and to restore the healthy
> glow of youthful skin. Lipstick exaggerates the hue and enhances the
> fullness of the lips, making them seem younger. Shampooing and
> brushing make the hair seem more luxuriant and healthy (see fig. 4).
> Women use a whole range of products to enhance the apparent size and
> brightness of their eyes in an attempt to recreate the breathless and
> starry-eyed innocence of youth. What women do individually with makeup
> is analogous to what natural selection has been doing for hundreds of
> generations.
>
> Humans are unusual in that both sexes evolved physically attractive
> traits through sexual selection. Human beards, for example, advertise
> biological quality in the same way that the gaudy plumage of the
> peacock does. This implies that both men and women compete among
> themselves for desirable mates. Handsome men and beautiful women are
> healthier and more fertile than their romantic competitors and
> transmit these qualities to children. Advertisement of biological
> quality through evolved bodily signals is not the only form that
> reproductive competition takes. People compete for marriage partners
> by being friendly and kind, and thereby advertising the qualities that
> are desirable in a long-term partnership. Men enhance their sexual
> attractiveness by competing for social status. This competition can
> take the form of reckless aggression, particularly in young men.
>
> Chapter Three Loves Labors Dating Competition and Aggression
>
> During the breeding season, male robins experience a rise in testos-
> terone production that makes them more aggressive. They are highly
> territorial and defend their home turf by mounting a vigorous physical
> assault on intruding male robins. The song of the male serves as a
> warning to rivals that this space is taken and thereby inhibits
> intruders.
>
> Singing, like fighting, is controlled by testosterone. This phenomenon
> has been demonstrated by injecting female songbirds with testosterone.
> Female songbirds normally do not sing, but they will do so after they
> have been treated with the male hormone.
>
> The increased aggression of males during the breeding season is an
> adaptation that helps them succeed in the struggle for access to
> reproductive females. Their testosterone surge primes them to defend a
> territory by singing and fighting. The territory is of critical
> importance for reproductive success. Males that cannot defend a
> breeding territory do not acquire mates.
>
> Human males do not have a breeding season, of course, but they compete
> most vigorously for mates when they are young, and when their
> testosterone levels are highest. Young men do not have breeding
> territories either, but they fight over something that plays the same
> role, namely, high social status among peers. Young men who have low
> social status-who are not "cool"-become the butt of jokes and are
> often viewed by girls as undesirable dating part- ners. Concern over
> "face," or status, is at the root of much appar- ently senseless
> violence between young men.
>
> The Science of Romance - by Nigel
Barberhttp://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/1573929700/
>
> - When asked to spell a word, men use the left hemisphere. Women use
> both sides of the brain.
>
> - Women recover language function better after left-hemisphere damage
> than men do.
>
> WOMEN'S SOCIAL SKILLS
>
> Grammar's study of modern courtship showed that women are socially
> more astute than men. They orchestrate social interactions so
> skillfully that they can control their date, even when the man
> believes he is running the show. The view that women arc more verbal
> than men is more than a stereotype. Women score higher on verbal
> tests, speak more words in a day, are quicker to verbal aggression,
> are more articulate, get verbal responses out rapidly, have more
> friends, and spend longer amounts of time speaking to them on the
> telephone. Moreover, when women talk, they reveal more intimate and
> meaningful information about themselves. Women are better listeners.
> They tend not to let their attention wander in the middle of a long
> story. They are more willing to offer comfort to another person a sex
> difference in empathy that is present even in young children.
>
> Women are more skilled in reading and using body language. countless
> laboratory experiments have showed that they are more skilled at
> reading facial expressions and detecting nonverbal signs of lying, for
> example. This research backs up the findings of field studie on
> courtship interactions.
>
> Psychologists often point to different childhood influences in order
> to explain why women have better interpersonal skills. They argue that
> giving a doll to a little girl and giving a tool set to a little boy
> conveys important messages about the kind of skills each needs to
> develop. While this may be true, it is also true that boys and girls
> differ in their inclinations regardless of how they are treated, a
> point already made for the development of aggression in boys. Parents
> who strive to inculcate nonviolence in their sons by keeping them away
> from violent toys and violent TV are often alarmed to discover that
> the boys imaginatively turn common objects into weapons of
> destruction. Sticks are guns or spears. Pine cones are hand grenades.
> Sex differences in aggression are largely due to biology, as already
> pointed out, but upbringing does accen- tuate them, as happens in
> warlike societies. Sex differences in social skills may also reflect
> evolved differences.
>
> Thus, women's abilities to entice and manipulate men in a dating
> context would have helped to ensure male support for their children.
> In the past, they may not have had much personal interest in striving
> for political power and social status, but they were attracted to men
> who had these qualities and therefore acquired them by association. In
> other words, a woman who succeeded in marrying a high-ranking man
> acquired high social status for herself. Even today, when women's
> earning power immediately after college is almost equivalent to that
> of men, they still express the same emotional needs that helped them
> to obtain paternal in vestment in the evolutionary past.
>
> The Science of Romance - by Nigel
Barberhttp://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/1573929700/
